Beans Beans Good For Your Heart

Happy hump day everyone! It's What I Ate Wednesday! 

I had no idea, but apparently one of my summer staples is beans. Lots and lots of beans. I was going through what I ate this past week and I'm finding them in at least one of my meals a day. Here are some of the things I've been eating lately:

An new breakfast idea from Peanut Butter Fingers, geek yogurt pancakes.  Two of my favorite things put together in one dish.

Blueberry Chobani, 2 egg whites and 1/2 cup oatmeal all blended up and made into 4 pancakes.

For lunch today I had a big salad...with a black bean salsa on top!

For dinners this week I made this bbq bean and chicken sausage dish.

In the mix: 4 links of chicken sausage chopped, two cans of cannellini beans rinsed and drained, several handfuls of chopped kale, bbq sauce!  This dish was delish! I've been having it for lunches throughout the week as well.

I also had some frozen chicken and bean chili in the fridge from a few weeks ago.

I think this is when I started to realize that the bean thing was starting to get out of hand.  But that's not where it ended. We also need beans for dinner! 

I finally tried chocolate covere's katie's chocolate chip blondies.  I've been eyeing these babies up for a while. And the reason why is the main ingredient: chickpeas!!

Ingredients:

1 can chickpeas rinsed and drained

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/8 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 tsp baking powder

2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup ground flax

1/4 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup chocolate chips

Mix all ingredients except chocolate chips in a food processor until smooth.  Fold in chocolate chips.  Spread in a greased 8x8 and bake at 350 for 30 minutes.  The results...amazing. No joke these are delicious.

I myself would never be able to tell that these were made with beans.  But, then again I don't have the most sophisticated taste buds. If it has chocolate in it, I will probably be eating it haha.

Workout wise I have been trucking away this week! I ran 4.5 miles on Monday and 3.25 miles on Tuesday.  Today we had a double header at volleyball and I am wiped out.

From my run yesterday:

Tomorrow I'll do 3 more and some abs and arms work and I'm hoping to get in either 9 or 10 miles on Saturday.  Matt and I arre also thinking of driving into philly to check out the race route if we have time.  We'll see.



A Weekend In Workouts

This was such a great weekend, I'm sad to see it come to and end.

This is how the weekend started:

Drinks at the Chesapeake Inn.

And this is how it ended:

My first instagram! haha.  Watching the olympics with the boys.

And there was a lot of fitness going on in between.  Saturday morning my plan was to wake up at 6am, eat a small breakfast and head to the park for my long run of 8 miles. In some sort of miracle I woke up 8 minutes before my alarm was about to go off and snuck out of the bedroom without waking up my super light sleeper of a husband. I should have known this would be a good day right from the start. I ate a peice of whole wheat toast with almond butter and craisins on top and headed out the door. I also ate one of these on my ride to the park:

LOVE these. They saved my life on my run.  I also brought with me one bottle filled with water, and one frozen bottle filled with half water and half coconut water.

I started my run and felt really good after the first lap (2.6 miles). I stopped and grabbed some water and started on my second lap.  After number 2 was done I still felt really good. I grabbed another Gu Chomp and started my third lap.  My legs were getting stiff, but nothing compared to last weekend. I had 8 miles on my schedule, but thought to myself, I can do this. I can do 9! So...I went for it!  I ran 9 miles!!!! This is the first run where I have felt totally comfortable and confidant that I can  actually finish this race in Septmeber!

10.04 pace!!

Part of the reason I felt so great I chalk up to the sun not coming out until an hour after I finished.  How did I  luck out with that?

I went out and got a foam roller on Thursday night. I rolled out my IT band on Thursday and Friday and man did it hurt! I had huge knots in both of my legs and managed to get them out.  This helped me big time on my run.  I also foam rolled after my run on Saturday and felt 10x better after doing this.

Sweaty hot mess. When I got home, I looked down at my shorts and it looked like I had peed my pants I was sweating so much. 

My legs didn't feel half bad the rest of the day and on Sunday morning I woke up feeling great. I found this great Medacine Ball workout on Blonde Ponytail. 

I did this workout at home and used Matt's 12lb medacine ball. It may have been a bit too heavy for me, but I finished!  I had to take a couple breaks though during the pushups, thrusters and plank holds.  I think an 8 or 10lb ball would have been perfect for me.  I can already feel my legs starting to get sore. OUCH. Hurst so good though. 

I'm so happy I had a good weekend of workouts and am excited that I am almost into the double digits for running. Either this coming weekend or next weekend I'll hope to hit 10 miles!!